BOB AND MARY CHAPTER THREE: THE JUNE WORKSHOP AND BEYOND “Can someone tell me just what the hell is going on around here?” Charlie Tuggle, 1971, at lunchtime on the first day of the June Workshop This was an amazing group of people, none more so than Jim Heenan who has his arm around my shoulder, third from the left kneeling. We met in this workshop and became lifelong friends. There are two future presidents of ITAA, Vince Gilpin and Ruth (Millar) McClendon. Jim, Ruth, George McClendon and I were future faculty. It was a month. 1 s you might remember, when Bob and I had met in Menlo Park, CA in late 1970, we had cobbled A together a contract for my training in the first months of 1971. It involved a small amount of money on my part (But most of what I had) and a large amount of generosity on his part. So, after my own treatment marathon in January I had participated in whatever event was taking place at the Institute. It was not constant By any stretch of the imagination, as Bob and Mary were traveling a great deal to drum up business from other places. But if it was happening, I was there. They also relented on their condition that I find my own food and shelter. Good thing. I was a very poor seminary student. During those early months of 1971 there was great anticipation Because they were aBout to conduct their first ever four-week workshop that for word economy they called a “Month Workshop.” This first workshop was to Be in June, Bracketing most of the month. As the time drew closer Bob and I agreed that I would attend the first two weeks of the workshop; my earlier monetary contract having expired. The cost of the month, including room and Board mind you, was $1,000. From my meager funds I could come up with $500 and therefore half of the workshop. Fortunately, I was aBle to secure a loan from my Presbytery back in West Virginia for the other $500 so I ended up being there the entire time. And, truth to tell, it had to work out in some manner because this was such a special experience that it is inconceivable that anyone would have allowed me to be ripped away from it in the middle, BoB and Mary included. The day arrived and all twenty-four participants assemBled in the living room of the main house. The room held us all and Bob and Mary began. One of the participants, a very colorful and talented counselor from Savannah, Georgia, named Charles (Charlie) Tuggle asked Bob and Mary if he should bring his tape recorder in from the car or was the morning just going to Be administrative and instructive. Famously, BoB said, “You might as well Bring it in. We might get into something this morning.” That was prophetic on BoB’s part Because they Began to engage with the participants immediately in a most dramatic way. This was a group of therapists, not lay people. There was one lawyer. His name was O. J. Coogler from Atlanta, Georgia. I don’t quite know what he was doing there, but he was an awfully nice guy and warm bodies do fill seats and pay tuition. But the rest of us were gung-ho and relatively free of debilitating mental illness. So, Bob and Mary went to work immediately getting contracts with each individual for the month. This involved some immediate interventions. Charlie probably saw more dramatic, emotional innovative psychotherapy in that first morning than he had in his career. As I am writing this for you, I am chuckling. I had already Been exposed to the level of drama that was the characteristic of their work, so I soaked in that morning with the feeling of smugness that only an insider can have and not a little proprietary pride. They were magic and they were genius. The morning shocked Charlie’s socks off and hence the quote from him aBove at the lunch hour. You’ve heard the expression of a person’s eyeballs coming out of their sockets. His were. He was in a genuine state of shock. He really didn’t understand what he had seen, because he was having the same experience, I had in my first marathon when the woman close to me tumBled out of her chair crying in a fetal position. But Charlie was a quick study and he got with the program in no time at all. And he Became one of the central characters in the month. And I mean a true character. He was short of stature with good 2 looks and more southern charm than you could put in a bottle. He was with me and two other men in Room Three in the corridor in front of the swimming pool. To this day I have a sentimental fondness for room Three. When I visited the 262 Gaffey Road property in 2014 (my first time there since Bob’s memorial in 1992), I took a numBer of pictures. One of them was of the door of room three. Charlie was also a talented jazz musician who played the trumpet. He was a born comic and showman. He entertained us in a hilarious fashion every night; either by playing his trumpet or doing spontaneous stand-up comedy. Today he would be a star at improvisation. Taking a look at the picture of the workshop group for a moment, I am in the front row of the picture, kneeling, second in from the left. The man on the far left, is Charlie. Looks like my right hand is in his crouch. And yeah, I’m the guy with the long hair and really scraggly beard. BoB called me “Moses” in those days. But of much greater personal importance to me was the man on my left, Jim Heenan. He has his arm around me and mine is around him, and for good reason. We emerged from that month devoted lifelong friends. As with BoB and Mary, or my wife, I don’t even know how to think aBout my life without Jim in it. Lots more aBout that later. Suffice it so say that all writing that I puBlish today related to redecision therapy, I dedicate to his memory. Enough said. Jim was also an integral part of the Room Three Foursome. He was also the reason I spent almost no nights sleeping in that room because he snored more loudly and competently than even my father had. I retreated to the barn where there was a small cot. By the time this workshop started Bob and Mary were using the barn as a second training space. They later expanded the space and put in carpeting, But at this time it had a concrete floor and walls and not much else. It was Spartan, but sufficient. It also had that cot at the back. Thank God. I was a really light sleeper. Referencing the picture again, the setting is on the path leading to the Barn. If you could draw the picture back just a little the corner of the barn would appear on the left. Just in Back of me in the picture is a very nice man named Lee Webster. He has his arm around Ruth Millar. Now that name might not Be familiar to you, But she is a very remarkaBle and notaBle and important person. On her left she has her arm around George McClendon. She and George met one another in this workshop. After a time, she Became Ruth McClendon and is clinically famous with that name. The four of us in that grouping, me, Jim, George and Ruth went on to Become memBers of the faculty. About Lee WeBster, I don’t remember too much, even exactly what it was that put him on the crutch you see. But I do rememBer that Bob and Mary had to Be away one evening and the cook was off. So, they left us with salad and steaks to cook on the charcoal grill. They were what we call Market Steaks (or Spencer Steaks) and there were a lot of them, far more than enough for each person. Lee and I figured we had never really learned just how many steaks we could eat in a single sitting, But we determined to find out. We just kept cooking ourselves another and another until we had had our fill. I don’t rememBer the numBer, But I was all of twenty-seven at the time and, as they say down on the farm, I had a stomach that ran down my leg. That was fun. It was also instructive. BoB and Mary were careful with money, but they were generous. They made sure we had really good food to eat and lots of good snacks in the refrigerator for during breaks. And it was very much like them to have extra steaks. Lee and I were very grateful. 3 Oh, for those of you who don’t know, Bob and Mary are in the Back row, third and fourth in from the right. Mary is in the striped shirt with her hands in front of her and Bob has his right arm around her. In this picture he has his signature long and flowing hair and no Beard. Sometimes he had a beard and sometimes he didn’t. It came and went on a pretty regular basis.